Moldova Is Rattled as Washington Welcomes a Feared Tycoon

CHISINAU, Moldova — In past campaigns in Moldova, an impoverished nation tugged between East and West, the most zealously pro-Russian political party foraged for votes by displaying photographs of its leader meeting in the Kremlin with President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia.

These days, however, it is a different photograph that is rallying support for Moscow’s allies in Europe’s poorest country: It shows a United States assistant secretary of state, Victoria J. Nuland, standing shoulder-to-shoulder in Washington with Vlad Plahotniuc, Moldova’s most-feared figure, a nominally pro-Western tycoon with a reputation so toxic that even his political friends usually try to keep their distance in public.

Pro-Russian leaders were delighted with the shot. “Politically and cynically this is of course very beneficial for me,” Igor Dodon, the leader of the Socialist Party, said of Ms. Nuland’s meeting in early May with Mr. Plahotniuc, whose nickname is Plaha, a Russian word that refers to the block of wood used in an execution.

That the United States would have dealings with such an unpopular figure has dismayed many Moldovans, particularly those who share Washington’s desire to steer the country out of Russia’s orbit and toward the West.

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Mr. Plahotniuc, Moldova’s most-feared figure, is a nominally pro-Western tycoon with a reputation so toxic that even his political friends usually try to keep their distance in public.CreditDumitru Doru/European Pressphoto Agency

“We were all in shock when that photograph first appeared,” said Natalia Morari, the host of a political talk show who has firsthand experience of Mr. Plahotniuc’s methods. She said she was threatened by one of the businessman’s associates early this year with a smear campaign featuring a sex tape illegally filmed in her own bedroom. The threat followed her show’s extensive coverage of anti-government protests fired largely by rage at Mr. Plahotniuc (pla-hoot-NOOK).

“Nobody considers Plahotniuc pro-European. He is pro-Plahotniuc and pro-corruption,” Ms. Morari said. While accounts of his current power and past sins were perhaps exaggerated, she said, many genuinely pro-Western Moldovans viewed the Washington meeting as a “betrayal.”

Whether Washington really does support Mr. Plahotniuc is a matter of feverish debate — and a question at the heart of America’s strategy in its neo-Cold War struggle with Moscow over former Soviet lands. Put simply, it is this: Should the West, eager to keep Russia and its proxies at bay, turn to people like Mr. Plahotniuc for help?

Asked what had transpired at the meeting and whether receiving Mr. Plahotniuc had played into the hands of pro-Russian forces, John Kirby, a State Department spokesman in Washington said that the businessman had been received as a member of a delegation led by Moldova’s deputy prime minister. Ms. Nuland, he added, had reiterated Washington’s support for “Moldova’s democratic and economic development,” and “underscored the need to fight corruption, including within the government.”

Andrian Candu, the speaker of Moldova’s Parliament and a close associate of Mr. Plahotniuc, said the businessman had been cast as a villain by political enemies and unfairly blamed for all the scandals and setbacks in Moldova since pro-Western parties took power in 2009. These include the mysterious disappearance of nearly a billion dollars from the country’s banking system. “He was made the most-hated man in the country because people needed to find somebody to blame,” Mr. Candu said.

The systematic looting of Moldova’s leading banks, which came to light last year, caused an uproar across the political spectrum. So far, however, the only political figure jailed in connection with a theft that seems to have involved much of the country’s political elite has been the former prime minister, Vlad Filat, a bitter rival of Mr. Plahotniuc.

Like many powerful figures in the former Soviet Union, Mr. Plahotniuc has drawn a tight veil over the sources of his wealth and power, cultivating an aura of mystery that has only enhanced his image as a shadowy kingmaker who can destroy foes with a flick of his finger.

He holds no official post in government. His only formal position is with the Moldovan Democratic Party; he is its deputy chairman. The party is part of a coalition government formed in January, the latest in a string of fragile and nominally pro-Western coalitions that have governed since 2009.

Also unclear are Mr. Plahotniuc’s ultimate loyalties and even his nationality. His opponents say he has passports from Russia, Moldova and Romania, where he lived for a time under a different identity. His party did not respond to questions about this citizenship and any previous identities.

Mr. Plahotniuc’s finances are equally murky. He has been accused by his foes over the years of multiple crimes, including human trafficking, but not formally charged. His business interests these days are more conventional and include a luxury hotel, a high-end nightclub and several television channels. But it is unclear how these generate the rivers of cash that he is believed to control. He rarely speaks in public and declined to be interviewed for this article.

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Moldovans took to the streets of Chisinau in a political protest in January.CreditEPA

When he does talk publicly, usually to media outlets he controls, he dismisses accusations against him as politically motivated “lies and manipulation.”

“He doesn’t just control the country, he owns it,” said Rinato Usatii, a populist politician who has built much of his own growing popularity on anger at Mr. Plahotniuc.

When protesters took to the streets last year and again early this year, the authorities did not intervene until a group of left-wing activists set up a protest encampment on the sidewalk outside Mr. Plahotniuc’s residence in the center of Chisinau. Police officers and the oligarch’s private security force quickly moved in to disband the protest.

The leader of that protest action, Grigore Petrenco, was later arrested and charged with causing a mass disturbance. Held for seven months — during which the United States State Department classified him as a “political prisoner” — he was released in February this year and placed under house arrest. He is now awaiting trial along with several other protesters.

Mr. Plahotniuc, Mr. Petrenco said, “doesn’t have a single state position but has all the levers of the state in his hands.” But perhaps his biggest asset, Mr. Petrenco added, is the geopolitical struggle between Moscow and Washington that has allowed him to masquerade as a friend of the West who “will provide stability and make sure Russian tanks don’t roll in.”

Pavel Filip, Moldova’s prime minister and a member of Mr. Plahotniuc’s party, acknowledged that the businessman “did not take care of his image” and said he should do more to address all the accusations against him.

“It is a myth that a single person controls this country,” he said, adding that his new government would prove its pro-Western credentials by taking “real action” to reform a ramshackle justice system and other branches of the state gnawed by corruption.

For many Moldovans, however, the photograph of the meeting with Ms. Nuland only confirmed Mr. Plahotniuc’s power.

After the meeting, television and other media outlets controlled by Mr. Plahotniuc quickly flooded Moldova with reports of how the United States was backing the oligarch as an anchor of stability and guarantor of Moldova’s tilt toward the West. Pro-Russian news media also jumped in, presenting the meeting as a proof that Washington does not care about ordinary people’s welfare, only geopolitical games and the interests of a deeply corrupt elite.

Iurie Leanca, a former prime minister who while in office in 2014 signed a trade and political deal with the European Union that infuriated Moscow, complained that Mr. Plahotniuc had used the Washington visit to try to launder his reputation. Yet, he said, Ms. Nuland was right to meet with him.

“They talk with the people with real power all over the world,” he said. “And he is the person with the real power in this country.”

A version of this article appears in print on , on Page A8 of the New York edition with the headline: Moldova Is Rattled, but Moscow’s Allies Cheer, as Washington Welcomes a Tycoon. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe